The train doesn’t stop yet at O’Hara’s new fish bait warehouse.
Frank O’Hara Sr., patriarch of the Rockland-based O’Hara Corporation, said his company’s expanded lobster bait business is going well, whether it’s two buckets for a fishermen’s pickup truck, or an 1,800-pound tote trucked to a fishermen’s co-op. But he said he is still trying to work out connections so frozen bait can be shipped via rail.
He said he has figured out rail transportation from the west coast to Montreal, but there is a gap between that Canadian city and Maine. If the freight could reach Brunswick by rail, Maine Eastern Railroad could haul it directly to the O’Hara warehouse. But making all the connections on the existing rail network is challenging, he said.
Maine Eastern spokesman Adam Lombardo explained that “it’s a logistics problem,” and that his company would be delighted to bring bait to Rockland by rail.
Lombardo, operations manager for the short-line railroad, said reefer (refrigerated) cars are often reserved, and not readily available to transport frozen fish. But he hasn’t given up and discussions with O’Hara are continuing.
Maine Eastern connects with Pan Am Railways—formerly known as Guilford Railways—at Brunswick, and from there, rail connections can be made throughout the U.S. and Canada. “Any business we can get a hold of would be good for Maine Eastern,” he said.
Meantime, O’Hara’s bait business is providing frozen fish to lobstermen from Stonington to Cundy’s Harbor. Some of the fish, including rock fish and a New Zealand fish called orange roughy, “seem to be more effective than herring,” he said. Herring catches have been restricted to protect the species, and lobstermen have had to turn to alternative bait.
The frozen bait business “seems to be doing all right,” O’Hara said. His firm continues to operate two pear trawlers out of Rockland, the Starlight and Sunlight, catching herring.
O’Hara, who can remember taking the overnight Pine Tree Special passenger train from Portland to Eastport many years ago, said he still hopes to make a rail connection.
Maine Eastern serves Dragon Cement Company in Thomaston, hauling 42 railcars per week carrying 4,000 tons of cement from the plant to the Rockland waterfront where it’s loaded onto a barge for shipment to other ports. The line also operates a seasonal excursion run between Brunswick and Rockland, which could transport bait if it were able to reach Brunswick.
The state owns those rails, known as the Rockland branch, and Amtrak is expected to extend passenger service from Portland to Brunswick soon.
O’Hara recently bought the former Bonnar-Vawter building, which abuts a siding of the old Maine Central Railroad tracks and is just off Route One (Park Street) in Rockland. Constructed in 1960, the building never had rail service, he said. New Hampshire-based Bonnar-Vawter, a printer with government contracts, closed after a few years and the one-story brick structure has been vacant for decades. The 58,000 square foot building was last used as a warehouse by Port Clyde Packing Company, a sardine cannery that went out of business years ago.
O’Hara has added a platform for loading and unloading trucks and, the company hopes, trains. In the meantime, O’Hara has used the tall-ceilinged building—which still has overhead rollers for paper from the printing days—for boat storage. O’Hara has a boatbuilding division, Mitchell Cove Boats.
The venerable O’Hara firm was founded by Frank’s father in Boston in 1907, and added the Tillson’s wharf, Rockland location around 1939. It’s now the company headquarters, and includes Journey’s End Marina.
Steve Cartwright is a freelance writer living in Waldoboro.